Verizon Wireless Turns To Mobile Advertising

Verizon wireless, the nation’s largest telecom operator, is now making the move into mobile advertising. According to an article recently completed by Ad Age, the company will be partnering with Precision Market Insights to harness the appropriate technology to complete their goals. The deal also includes collaborating with BlueKai, a data management provider, Brightroll, a video ad platform and, finally, Run and Turn, an advertising technology provider. Together, these companies will create a mobile advertising campaign that can hopefully reach Verizon’s demographic, which increasingly relies on mobile devices to access browsers.

Verizon makes the move to mobile advertising.

United States wireless operators have previously been wary of entering the mobile marketing terrain, based on a lack of cookies that makes providing appropriate and appealing ads difficult. Without cookies, data is difficult to obtain, which makes it impossible to provide appealing ads to consumers as they browse various sites. However, PrecisionID has found a solution to this problem, which has assured Verizon’s concerns of the potential for profit sufficiently to proceed.

This new implementation from PrecisionID tracks requests from consumers to visit sites through the Verizon network. It then chunks the data with an anonymous identifier to be delivered back to Verizon. From there, ads can be chosen specifically for the individual on the device. However, this still does not hold the capability to connect an individual’s browsing preference from one device to another. For instance, if a consumer searches for shoes on their phone, that search result will not follow them to influence their ads provided on their tablet. Essentially, despite the lack of connectivity between devices, this solution by PrecisionID allows for a cookie-like component to track browsing and supply consumers will applicable ads thereafter.

Some ad experts are wary of the system, however. They fear the potential for sales and profits will be dwarfed by certain backlashes to data; in essence, the cost of tracking efforts may exceed the amount of profit earned. However, Verizon is moving forward with the plan, which will affect their one hundred and three million retail subscribers. Corporate and government subscribers are excluded from the marketing campaign; likewise, should a retail subscriber remain uninterested in personalized ads for their browsing, they can adjust the privacy settings with Verizon to override the incoming ads.